


as silver moon upon the ice doth glow

by Burning_Nightingale



Series: The Mage Of Hokanniemi [2]
Category: A Redtail's Dream (Webcomic), Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Background Character Death, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Magic, Monsters, Non-Graphic Violence, Post-Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-01
Updated: 2018-06-01
Packaged: 2019-05-16 21:08:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14818898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/pseuds/Burning_Nightingale
Summary: Hannu Viitanen has accepted his role as a mage, but is still newly come into his power. There are many things to learn, and many dangers to face.When Samuli organises an expedition into the nearest town, Hannu reluctantly agrees to go with him. But with danger on all sides and young Tuomi tagging along with the group, it may be more than a fledgling mage can handle.





	as silver moon upon the ice doth glow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lunarium](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lunarium/gifts).



> Couldn't get the thought of this sequel out of my head! This plotbunny attacked me and wouldn't let go; the idea of this universe is sinking into my bones. Hopefully you don't mind a little bit more of this AU, Lunarium ;)

Pressing his hand to the snow, Hannu can feel the wood _breathe_.

It’s subtle, mere tingles and brushstrokes along the strings that make up the web of light he visualises when he makes contact with the forest. Echoes radiate through the web, traces of footfalls under trees over a hundred miles away.

Much closer, something moves.

Hannu focuses in on it. Mere miles away, something infected walks. Hannu can feel its intent; it sneaks, striving to be unheard, stalking something.

When Hannu stretches his senses further, he can feel its prey. A human, alone in the wood.

Like a shadow, Hannu moves through the trees. He slips past unseen dangers, visible now to him; even in six short months, Kokko’s training has done wonders.

He is upon the creature before it knows he’s arrived. It moves to strike, the hunter noticing it just a fraction too late; and with all is attention focused on the kill, it doesn’t see Hannu coming. 

The hunter throws himself to the side, narrowly avoiding the beast’s teeth, as Hannu drives his knife through its brain. The creature dies with a low, pitiful moan, collapsing under Hannu into a pile of gory skin and bone.

When he catches sight of the hunter, still lying winded in the snow, he rolls his eyes and holds out his hand. “Very soon you are going to get caught, and I won’t be here to save you.”

Samuli glares up at him and ignores his proffered hand, getting up by himself. “Don’t get cocky; that’s only the second time.”

 _Two times too many_ , Hannu thinks, but he says nothing, just shrugs.

“What are you doing out here alone, anyway?” Samuli asks.

“I could ask you the same.”

“I’m not alone,” Samuli says, “Asta is with me.”

Hannu can hear the accusation in Samuli’s tone. _Asta is with me because you aren’t._

Hannu had never meant to abandon Samuli and their hunting trips. But as his skills as a mage grew, it became less and less helpful to have someone else by his side. He moves faster, quieter, alone. 

“Where is she?” he asks. 

“We split up to flank a deer, which I imagine is long gone by now.” Samuli makes it sound as if that’s Hannu’s fault, but Hannu doesn’t rise to the bait.

“We should find her,” Hannu says, “There may be others.”

Samuli indicates a direction, and they move off together in silence. Hannu leans into his other-sense, trying to detect Asta or another creature, but he sees nothing. Too focused on listening to what the wood is telling him, he doesn’t understand Samuli’s question, though he hears him speak. “What?”

“How do you do it?” Samuli repeats. “Sneak up on them, kill them, wander the woods alone.”

 _How is it possible that you can use magic?_ Is what Samuli truly wants to know, and Hannu has no answer. “The forest tells me things,” he says. 

“And shooting - you know - magic beams from your hands? Does the forest tell you how to do that, too?”

Samuli hasn’t forgotten their encounter six months ago, clearly, though they’ve never spoken about it. “It’s just something I can do,” Hannu snaps, “Why question it?”

He _has_ questioned it, of course. He’s asked Kokko all these questions and more. _How is it that I can use magic? How is it that magic has come back now, when it was gone before?_

“When something is taken, something must be given in return,” was Kokko’s only answer. “Thus, the wold remains in Balance.”

As to why this power had chosen Hannu, she had no answer.

“It’s- it’s magic,” Samuli says now, “It’s not supposed to exist.”

“Neither are monsters,” Hannu says, and that kills the conversation.

/

“Mrs Hare told me something interesting this morning,” Kokko says that night.

Hannu looks up at her, where she’s perched on a large branch over his head. His luonto sleeps on the next branch over, head tucked under his wing. 

Half their lessons take place in the dreamworld now that Hannu has better control over his haven. Even Kokko needs to seek his permission to gain entrance; it is as safe as they can be, while they practise these things. 

“What?” Hannu asks.

“She said that Little Hare has been talking to Tuomi Kinnunen.”

Hannu frowns. “But how could Tuomi see him? Unless…”

“Yes,” Kokko says, “I believe he has the same gift you do, Hannu. You should guide him, and ask him to join our lessons. Little Hare will do his best, but he has limited experience tutoring mortals in these gifts.”

Two different feelings war inside Hannu. On the one hand, it might be a relief, to have someone else to share the weirdness. On the other, it’s _Tuomi_.

Still, he follows Kokko’s advice, and knocks on the door of Paju and Tuomi’s room the next morning.

A sleepy, cranky Tuomi opens the door, already snapping, “Paju, I don’t-” He stops with his mouth hanging open when he sees Hannu instead of his sister. “What do you want?”

“I need to speak to you,” Hannu says.

“I don’t want-”

“It’s about the spirits,” Hannu interrupts, “About you and Little Hare.”

For once, Tuomi looks nervous. “What- what about him?”

“Come outside and I’ll tell you.”

They troop downstairs, out through the main room where everyone is eating. “Where are you going without breakfast, Tuomi?” Paju snaps as they pass.

Hannu waves her away. “We won’t be long,” he says, opening the front door.

They go down to the lake shore, where the fishermen have long since cast off and started their day out on the water. Hannu can see them out there, hauling nets in over the side. 

“How do you know about the spirits?” Tuomi demands.

Hannu turns to him. “Do you remember what happened to Hokanniemi?”

“Little Hare mentioned it,” Tuomi said, “The town got stuck between life and death, or something. He said that’s how we met. I…sometimes I remember it, a little. Like remembering a dream.”

“I remember all of it,” Hannu said, “because the stupid fox made me and Ville fix it.”

“Yeah, Little Hare mentioned that, actually.” Tuomi scowls. “He said you tried to drown me.”

Hannu folds his arms. “You wanted to stay there and let half the village die. You were kind of being a brat.”

Tuomi scowls and says nothing.

“Anyway, I’ve been talking to Kokko, the eagle spirit,” Hannu says, “She thinks you’ve got the potential to be a mage, a magic user, and she wants to teach you.”

Tuomi wrinkles his nose. “Little Hare is already teaching me.”

“Yeah, but Little Hare is like, a spirit teenager. Kokko knows ten times the stuff he does.”

As soon as Hannu says it, he knows it’s a mistake. Tuomi scowls harder and says, “No.”

“She’s a super powerful spirit who’s thousands of years old, and she’s offering to teach you, lowly human Tuomi, how to use magic.”

Tuomi sticks out his tongue. “Don’t care.”

Hannu throws up his hands. “Suit yourself, I guess.”

/

Kokko bothers him several more times about Tuomi, but the teenager is flatly ignoring him, so Hannu gives up. If Kokko wants to teach Tuomi, she can just speak to him herself.

A week later, the nightmare visits Hannu for the first time in months.

He lies awake in the dark afterwards, listening to Ville and Joona’s slow, even breaths. He can feel them, as if they give off some faint essence that the strange sixth sense inside him can track. He can feel Tuomi’s turbulence and Paju’s calm from across the hall, and, fainter, Jouko and his daughters from the room at the other end of the house.

It’s peaceful. Quiet. It doesn’t feel like the end of the world.

Hannu remembers Kielo Miettinen saying, ‘The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away’. It sounds a lot like what Kokko says about the post-Rash world.

Hannu wonders where Kielo is, and if she still believes in her God. Did she survive? Did anyone else from Hokanniemi survive?

And where are they now?

/

When Hannu comes downstairs in the morning, Paju says, “Samuli was here earlier, looking for you.”

Hannu frowns. “What did he want?”

“He didn’t say. He’s gone down to his house.”

Samuli’s house isn’t a house, yet; it’s a series of earthworks, preparations for a cabin. Samuli is crouched down, measuring something, with Maija perched on a mound of earth nearby. She meows as Hannu comes closer.

Samuli looks up. “There you are,” he says, setting the measuring tape aside. 

“Paju said you were looking for me,” Hannu says, reaching down to scratch Maija’s head.

“Yes.” Samuli stands, brushing off his hands on his trousers. “You’ve heard of the plan to mount an expedition into town?”

Hannu has, and he’d voted against it, though his side had lost. “What about it?”

“Are you going?”

“Should I be?”

“You’re the one with the magic,” Samuli says, “So you tell me.”

They stare at each other for a long moment, Maija’s loud purrs the only sound. “You want me to come,” Hannu says finally. 

“Your skills might be helpful,” Samuli says, “Then again, since I don’t know what they are, maybe they won’t.”

Hannu purses his lips. “So you want to know more about magic.”

“That would be handy.”

Hannu has known this was coming, from the moment he’d saved Samuli from the beast in that deserted house. The explanation; the moment one more person would know about Puppy-fox, and the dreamworld, and everything else.

“Sit down,” he instructs, “This will take a while.”

Samuli listens to the entire long, winding story with only minimal interruptions. When Hannu reaches the end, they sit in silence for a good five minutes, Hannu staring out over the lake, Samuli staring down at his hands.

“You could have died,” Samuli says.

“So could everyone.”

“But you most of all,” Samuli says. His voice is a rough whisper. “After all that, you could have died- and I-”

“You wouldn’t have died,” Hannu says, “You’d have been fine.”

Samuli raises his head and looks at him with haunted eyes. “Exactly.”

Hannu can’t hold his gaze. He looks away, back to the lake. “So that’s. That. And later, after I killed that thing in the cabin, Kokko came back, and she began to teach me….” Hannu lets the words spill from his mouth, explaining his magic and mage training in quick, sharp bursts. “And that’s all you need to know,” he concludes. “Will that be helpful?”

Samuli shakes his head, like a dog ridding itself of a fly. “What?”

“On the expedition to town.”

“You can sense monsters, of course you should come. We need you.”

Hannu pauses. “We?”

“Asta and I have been planning this from the beginning.”

“Oh.” Hannu blinks. “I voted against it.”

Samuli raises his eyebrows. “Really?”

“I thought it was an unnecessary risk.”

“But you’ll come,” Samuli says, sounding sure and confident.

That rankles a little, but something in Hannu knows he can’t refuse. “If you’re set on going, I suppose I have to.”

/

Given that Tuomi has been ignoring him for over a week, Hannu is surprised to find him waiting outside his door when he returns from talking with Samuli. “What do you want?”

Tuomi motions at Hannu’s door and whispers, “Not where Paju can hear.”

Hannu rolls his eyes, but he lets Tuomi into the room anyway. Ville is out, but Joona is lounging on his bed, probably avoiding some kind of manual labour. “Hey,” he says, grinning at them both.

“Hey,” Hannu returns, sitting down on his bed. “Now, what do you want, Tuomi?”

Tuomi looks furtively at the door, then says, “I want to go on the expedition to town with you.”

Hannu raises his eyebrows as Joona splutters. “No. You’re only a kid.”

Tuomi’s eyes flash, and he draws himself up to his limited full height. “I’m fifteen now, and I’m a mage. I can handle it.”

“You’re a what?” Joona asks, at the same time Hannu says, “Not much of one, not yet. Not enough to come on a dangerous mission off the island.”

“There’s twenty people going,” Tuomi says, “That’s a fifth of our entire population. You can’t look after them all by yourself; I need to come.”

Tuomi has a point, even if Hannu doesn’t want to admit it. “Perhaps if you stayed with the group,” he says slowly. 

Tuomi’s eyes light up, while Joona looks at Hannu like he’s mad. “Seriously, Hannu?”

“Seriously. It could be handy to have him along.”

“He’s fifteen,” Joona says, “Viljami will never go for it.”

“Viljami isn’t authorising people for the mission,” Hannu says, “Samuli is.”

“So you’ll really ask him to let me go?” Tuomi asks, bouncing from foot to foot.

“On one condition.”

Tuomi stops bouncing. “What?”

“You come train with me and Kokko.”

Tuomi lets out a long groan. “Noooo, Hannu!”

“You and who?” Joona asks.

“It’s not important. Well, Tuomi, yes or no?”

Tuomi glares at him, and Hannu internally congratulates himself on his stroke of brilliance. It means he’ll have to convince Samuli - and Paju - that Tuomi should be allowed on the mission, and he’ll have to look after the kid while they’re off the island - but it will get Kokko off his back, and it really will help Tuomi in the long run.  

After chewing his lip for a moment, Tuomi says, “Fine. I’ll come train with you and the stupid birdbrain.”

“Good. And I’ll convince Samuli to put you on the list for the expedition.”

Joona shakes his head. “Paju is gonna have your head on a spike, Hannu.”

/

Samuli is sceptical, but eventually agrees with Hannu, and adds Tuomi to the roster. “He’s fifteen,” he says as he checks the spelling on Tuomi’s surname, “Are you sure?”

“He’ll help. Probably.” Hannu tries a smile. Samuli doesn’t look completely convinced, but he still adds Tuomi to the list.

But of course, per the community rules, the roster goes up on the town’s noticeboard for general inspection a week before they’re due to head out – and Paju being Paju, she’s there to read it the moment it gets nailed to the board. 

The door of the house slams open with such violence that everyone jumps half a foot. A moment later, Paju roars, “ _Tuomi Kinnunen_!”

Everyone - even Jouko - scrambles up and retreats upstairs, leaving Tuomi sitting alone at the table, facing down his sister with the same expression he might use to face a troll. Hannu, caught in the act of washing dishes, remains where he is. 

“ _Why is your name on this roster_?!” Paju yells, waving said document above her head. Apparently, she’d ripped it from the wall in a passionate fit of anger.

“Because I’m going,” Tuomi says. Hannu has to admire the way his voice remains relatively firm and steady.

“How- _how_ did you convince Samuli to let you sign up?” Paju demands.

Tuomi opens his mouth, but it’s Hannu who answers. “It was me, Paju.”

Paju turns to him, clearly only just noticing him. “You?” she growls.

Hannu nods. “Yes.”

“ _Why_?”

 _Because your brother has special magic powers and we need them_. But Paju was too practical to ever believe in magic. “Because we need someone small and quick, Paju. Someone light on their feet. Tuomi’s good at that sort of thing.”

“He’s a _child_ ,” Paju says.

“He’ll be safe,” Hannu says, “We’ll keep him safe, I promise. I’ll bring him home myself if it gets dangerous.”

“Please, Paju,” Tuomi chimes in, “They need me, and I really think I can do this.”

Paju looks back and forth between them, and Hannu realises with a start that there are tears in her eyes. “I can’t- he’s my brother, Hannu.”

Hannu hears what she’s not saying. _He’s all I have left._

“I know,” Hannu says, his voice as comforting as he’s ever managed to make it. “But we need him, we really do. I’ll make sure he stays safe, I promise.”

Paju wavers, and Tuomi gives her a dose of the big, pleading puppy-eyes. After a moment of indecision, she walks up to Hannu, poking him in the chest. “If anything happens to him,” she says, her voice low and dangerous, “I _will_ kill you, Hannu Viitanen.”

Paju has threatened that many times; this is the first time Hannu knows she means it. “Agreed,” he says quietly. 

They stay there for a few moments, holding each other’s gaze. Paju knows she has been heard and understood. Then she turns and throws her arms around Tuomi, hugging him tight. “You stay with Hannu and the others _at all times_ , do you hear me?” she tells him, her voice thick. 

A voice says from the door, “Um, Paju? Can I have the roster back now?”

It’s Heikki Kotilainen, the town secretary, standing nervously just inside the door. Paju pulls back from Tuomi and wipes her eyes. “Yes- sorry, Heikki- I’ll come back with it now.”

As soon as the door closes behind her, Hannu turns and says, “You owe me _forever._ ”

Tuomi lets his head fall to the table top with a groan. 

/

Despite everyone’s fears, the expedition makes it to town without a problem. 

Hannu keeps alert, watching every shadow, and he can tell Tuomi is trying to copy him, despite the excitement he can barely contain.

There aren’t enough tents to make camp outside, so they pick a building that seems clean. They get as comfortable as they can, lighting small fires and passing out rations. There isn’t a lot of talking; even if the others can’t sense the beasts like Hannu and Tuomi can, they know they’re in dangerous territory.

Anxiety has draped itself over Hannu like a second skin, and he can’t relax, can’t get comfortable. There are creatures everywhere in this town, out of sight but not out of mind, his nerves jangling with alarm like church bells ringing out peal after peal. They are _unsafe_ , and there are so many threats that he can’t pinpoint which is most likely to come for them first. As the talk winds down and the others turn in for the night, Hannu sits up alone, one hand on the rifle at his side. Something is out there, and if they make one wrong move, it will find them.

Across from him, Tuomi twists and turns in his sleeping bag. He can feel it too.

Someone lays a hand on his arm. “Something’s wrong,” Samuli’s voice says, close by his left ear.

“This place is _infested_ ,” Hannu whispers, “This entire town-”

“Where?” Samuli goes down to one knee beside him. “Where are they coming from?”

“Nowhere yet, I think - there’s _so many_ of them, it’s hard to tell. I mean- I think they haven’t noticed us. Yet.”

“Let’s hope it stays that way,” Samuli mutters.

“I’m pretty much useless here,” Hannu admits, “There’s so many of them - it’s overwhelming.”

“But you’d know if one was coming right for us, right?” Samuli asks, sitting down beside him.

“I don’t know. I think so. This is all trial and error.”

Samuli shrugs. “That’s all anything is.”

They sit there for a while in silence. Hannu tries to calm his racing heart, before giving it up as impossible; there’s no way he’ll be able to relax in this place. 

After about an hour, Samuli says quietly, “You know, I should probably say-”

A scream splits the night.

Instantly Hannu and Samuli are on their feet, guns in hand. The other sentries have leapt up, and the one closest to the back door kicks it open, calling out, “Taune! Are you alright?”

 _Obviously not_ , Hannu thinks, as he hops and stumbles over sleeping bodies in the dark, making for the back door. 

The sentry is peering out, the barrel of his gun sweeping in an arc across the darkness outside, but there’s nothing to see. “Taune went out there a few minutes ago,” he says breathlessly when Hannu reaches his side, “He just wanted to relieve himself-”

Out in the night, they hear a whimper - and then a low, ominous growl. 

“Taune?” the sentry whispers, his voice shaking with fear.

“That’s not Taune,” Hannu says, bringing his gun up. Or rather, whatever’s left of Taune, they won’t be bringing him back to the village - they’ll be fighting off his killer instead. Hannu can feel something out there, something with its attention fixed on them. It’s stalking towards them through the dark.

Hannu feels someone clutch his waist. “They’re there,” Tuomi’s voice says, “So many of them-”

“Out the front,” Hannu says, low and quiet. “Back to the village. Quickly.”

Behind him, he hears Samuli and Asta’s voices pick up the instruction as a command, and hears the rustling and curses as everyone makes quickly for the door. “Go with Samuli,” he tells Tuomi, pushing him away, “Get them back to Hietasaari.”

Tuomi hesitates, then goes. 

“What about Taune?” The sentry is still there, hovering at Hannu’s shoulder. 

“He’s gone,” Hannu says bluntly, “If you don’t want to go the same way, get out of here.”

The sentry lets out a small, pained little noise, and for a moment Hannu thinks he’ll dash out the door, right into the jaws of whatever’s waiting out there. Then, with one agonised moan, he turns and dashes towards the front door. 

Still nothing has appeared in the darkness, but Hannu can feel it there, considering him. He slams the door closed and backs up, making for the front door while keeping his eyes fixed on the back. 

He’s five steps from the front wall when the back door caves in. Several writhing, snake-like creatures burst through, slithering across the dirt floor, followed by something that looks like a twisted, gross perversion of a dog. Hannu steps up his pace, making it out of the front door just as the dog-thing’s head turns toward him. 

Outside, the night is dark and full of swirling, unexpected snow. It’s unusual and unlucky for snow to fall this early in the season; yet another bad omen, Hannu thinks. He can just about make out dark figures struggling up the road ahead of him, and he follows, stumbling with the dark and slippery footing. 

He can feel the town around him stirring, the disturbed monsters’ agitation alerting their fellows, the whole sick mass coming awake and aware and _hungry_ -

A roar from behind him shatters the silence.

Hannu turns. A huge monster is ripping its way out of a building on the left, a thing bigger than any beast or creature Hannu has ever seen, roaring and snarling as it comes. It no longer bears a resemblance to any Old World animal; it rears above the road, a hulking, writhing mass of grotesque flesh.

Fear chokes Hannu’s throat, and suddenly he’s back in Tuonela, with the demonic swan bearing down on him, and nowhere to hide, nothing to defend himself. The monster roars, and screams echo behind him, and Hannu thinks of Ville, who will watch and watch at the beach every day, but Hannu will never come home-

 _No_ , he thinks. One strong word, suffused with power. Without conscious thought, Hannu lifts his hand, and his power flares.

The flash lights up the night like an atomic bomb, a thunderclap of sound echoing around the buildings and the forest. Hannu watches the creature stumble, then fall, still roaring its anger to the heavens.

Hannu’s legs give out under him, but arms catch him from behind and grip tight around his waist. “I can’t believe we’re doing this again,” Samuli’s voice growls in his ear.

“Run…Samuli…”

“Don’t need to tell me that.” Samuli is dragging him away, Hannu trying and failing to get his legs under him. He can hear shouts in the distance, but he can’t make out what they’re saying. Time slows to a crawl as Samuli drags him on and on through the dark forest.

Hannu must have fallen asleep or blacked out, because when he wakes he’s sitting with his back against a tree, and Samuli gently slapping his face. “Wha-?”

“Good gods.” Samuli sits back on his heels. “Don’t scare me like that.”

“Sorry,” Hannu says, slurring the word. 

“It’s alright, you’re alright.” Samuli sits down next to him, very warm against Hannu’s side. It’s cold and dark out here in the forest; Hannu can barely see beyond his own nose. Samuli snakes an arm around his shoulders and pulls him close. “We just need to rest a little,” he says, his voice more gentle and comforting than Hannu has ever heard it, “Just enough to get back on our feet.”

Hannu lets his head rest on Samuli’s shoulder, grateful for the darkness. He would never have the courage to do it in the light, but right now it needs it; the rest, and the comfort of someone else’s warmth. “Tuomi,” he whispers, “Where-”

“He went on ahead with the others,” Samuli says.

Hannu screws his eyes shut. If Tuomi is dead, it’s all his fault. “I’m no good at this,” he whispers, turning his face into Samuli’s shoulder. “One monster and I’m done. No good at this at all.”

“You’ll get better,” Samuli says, squeezing his shoulders.

“Not if I die.”

“You’re a goddamn pessimist.” Perhaps he’s imagining it, but he thinks Samuli sounds fond. 

“It’s the end of the world,” he mutters.

“Or the beginning of the new one.”

“Now you sound like Kokko.”

“The bird?”

“The _spirit_.”

They fall silent for a while, and Hannu slips in and out sleep, feeling the strength return to him little by little. It’s cold, out here at night at the beginning of autumn, but not unbearably so. 

Eventually Samuli wakes him and helps him to his feet. He was right; the short rest has restored Hannu somewhat, and he can now walk himself, so long as his arm remains slung around Samuli’s shoulders.

“Y’know,” Samuli says, as they trudge toward the steadily lightening sky in the distance, “This reminds me of that other time you killed a monster with the wave of a hand. At least this time you can walk.”

“You never told me how we got home after that,” Hannu says.

“I dragged your limp body back to Hietasaari, about eighty per cent certain you were dead,” Samuli says. “I spent the whole journey back thinking, God, what if he died to save me? If you had died, I would’ve felt like shit.” He huffs out a laugh. “Y’know, I meant to tell you-” Then he stops. Hannu waits for him to finish the sentence, but the silence stretches.

“Tell me what?” Hannu asks quietly.

Samuli remains silent for another agonisingly long second. “You remember right before that door burst open,” he begins in a low voice, “I was about to say something, but you cut me off-”

“Yeah,” Hannu says. He wasn’t ready to hear what Samuli had to say then; but he might, just maybe, be ready now.

“Back then, I was just going to say, ‘I don’t hate you’.” Samuli’s laugh is slightly strained. “Now, though, if we were there again, I think I would say…”

“‘You’re tolerable’?” Hannu suggests.

Samuli laughs. “No. I would say…I would just say that I care about you.”

Hannu hasn’t blushed since high school; he’s glad it’s dark now, so Samuli can’t see. “Well. Same here.”

“What a pair of fools we make,” Samuli murmurs.

Hannu wants to say something grand, something poetic, something to match the emotion welled up and bursting in his chest; but instead he hears Samuli say, “Is that a light ahead?”

When Hannu looks, he spots the flicker of firelight through the trees.

The others have set up the tents, with a circle of guards posted around them. There are so many standing in the guards’ circle, Hannu wonders if anyone is actually sleeping. 

Asta greets them as they stagger into camp. “It’s so good to see you alive,” she says, embracing them both. “We had given you up.”

“Not quite beaten yet,” Samuli says, “Hannu here needs to lie down. There any spare space in those tents?”

Apparently there’s a lot, because the tent Samuli and Asta leave him in is unoccupied, save for a small lump in the corner. When the lump moves, Hannu realises it’s Tuomi, and a wave of relief washes over him, so strong it almost sends him to the ground. 

Tuomi is asleep, but his face is troubled, as if he’s caught in bad dreams. Hannu runs a gentle hand over his hair the way he’s seen Paju do, and Tuomi’s face clears a little. 

Hannu falls back into his own sleeping bag, exhausted, and falls into a deep, dreamless sleep.

/

When he wakes, he’s warm, but uncomfortable. Sleeping on the hard ground is still unfamiliar to him, and he misses his warm, soft bed.

“Hannu?” Tuomi’s voice asks.

“M’awake,” he mumbles, pushing himself up onto his elbows.

Tuomi is sitting across the tent from him, his eyes wide in the half-darkness. “You’re finally awake,” he says.

“Finally?”

“You’ve been asleep for like, twelve hours.” 

Hannu sits up suddenly. “Twelve hours?! But- the beasts-”

“They’re gone,” Tuomi says, “I think they stayed in the town. You scared them when you killed that big one, maybe. But I can’t feel them anymore, and Samuli said we should let you regain your strength-”

“But twelve hours,” Hannu says, “And by now it’ll be getting dark again-”

“Don’t get mad at me,” Tuomi snaps, “Take it up with Samuli; he’s the one who made the decision.”

“Right.” Hannu flops back down onto the sleeping bag. Despite sleeping for twelve hours, he’s still tired. “Are you okay, Tuomi?”

“Yeah.”

Hannu looks up at him. “Really?”

Tuomi glances at him, then looks away. “I- mostly,” he says, wrapping his arms around his knees. “I just want to go home,” he says quietly. 

“We will,” Hannu says, “We’ll be home tomorrow, Tuomi, promise.”

Tuomi just nods.

“You got any food?” Hannu asks, “I’m starving.”

Tuomi goes out and finds him food, and brings Samuli back with him, which results in a big argument over lost time. When Samuli exits their tent, fuming, Hannu tucks into his meal, his mood blackened. Screw resting; what they need to is to be home, _safe_.

Hannu assumes more people will join them in the tent, but the hour grows later and later and no one else appears. Hannu remembers the wall of people standing around the camp last night, and wonders if they’re still there - and if he shouldn’t go out and join them.

“Don’t go,” Tuomi says, as if he’s reading Hannu’s mind.

Hannu looks at him; he looks scared, biting his lip, eyes wide. “What?”

“I can see you looking at the door. Please don’t leave me in here alone.”

Hannu has never seen Tuomi so openly vulnerable. “Okay,” he says, settling back down, “I’m not going anywhere. You try and go to sleep, okay?”

Tuomi lies down, but his eyes remain open. When Hannu has turned out the small lamp and lain down opposite him, Tuomi whispers into the darkness, “I didn’t think they would look like that.”

Hannu props himself up on one elbow. “What? Who?”

“The beasts. Some of them looked like…animals.”

“They were animals, before.”

“I know. But I thought they would look more like…monsters.”

Hannu didn’t know what to say to that. “Tuomi,” he said, “what happened after I killed the big monster?”

“We ran into the trees. There were other things in there; they took people. They just looked like- like big dogs, jumping out of the shadows. I just- I just kept running.”

“That’s good,” Hannu said, “That’s how you stay alive.”

“But they- they’re dead now. And I’m not.”

“It’s all just luck, Tuomi. If you’d been a metre to the left, maybe they would have taken you instead. But you weren’t, and they didn’t. You can’t hold yourself to blame.”

“Right.” Tuomi doesn’t sound convinced. There’s a long silence, and Hannu thinks Tuomi has fallen asleep, but then he says, “Hannu? When I start having lessons with Kokko, do I have to stop with Little Hare?”

Hannu laughs into the darkness. “No, Tuomi. I think you two can keep going, if you want.”

/

When they get back to Hietasaari, Samuli goes missing for a few days.

Hannu knows why. They lost good men and women on the expedition, and all for nothing. Samuli and Asta spearheaded the whole thing, from inception to planning to execution, and they both feel responsible. 

Hannu waits. Samuli will come back; there will be time enough to talk.

Ville and Jonna both cry when Hannu and Tuomi arrive home, though Jonna later hotly denies that she did. Ville sees no shame in crying and does so copiously, hanging onto Hannu’s sleeve; Hannu allows it, because Ville is his best friend, and good friends make sacrifices.

Paju cries too, when she has her face pressed into Tuomi’s hair and no one but Hannu can see. He doesn’t rat her out.

He and Tuomi have their first lesson with Kokko, and Tuomi learns why it’s not a good idea to insult a spirit. Little Hare insists on sitting in on the lesson, so he can ‘monitor his pupil’s progress’ (Kokko must know he just wants to pinch her spells, but she allows it with good grace). 

And, eventually, Samuli returns.

Hannu finds him sitting on the lake shore, tossing rocks into the water. “You didn’t catch anything?” he asks.

“What do you think,” Samuli says darkly.

Hannu sits beside him on the shore. “You know,” he says after a while, “That house of yours would go up a lot quicker with another pair of hands.”

Samuli says nothing for a while. Hannu sits with his heart in his mouth, twisting his hands in his lap. He has been planning this, this casual offer, ever since they returned to Hietasaari. 

“My plan,” Samuli says slowly, “was to build it alone, because I would live there alone. If two people were to build it…”

Hannu understands. “Sounds…sounds like a good plan to me,” he says, swallowing.

He finally risks a glance at Samuli, and finds the other man looking at him with a strange mix of sorrow and hope on his face. 

It will take a long time for the wounds from this past week to heal. It will take a long time for Samuli to forgive himself, if he ever does; it will take a long time for Hannu to rebuild his confidence in his abilities.

But maybe, together…

“This isn’t the end of the world,” Hannu says, reaching out to take Samuli’s hand, “But the beginning of the new one.”

 

 


End file.
